Speaking to the international development committee, Priti Patel was questioned on issues including the Rohingya crisis and government attempts to change the rules on foreign aid.
Photograph: Parliament TV

The international development secretary has rejected speculation about a takeover of her department by the foreign office.

Appearing before MPs in a parliamentary committee, Priti Patel was asked about concerns over a creeping merger of the international development department (DfID) with the FCO.

She said: “DfID is a standalone government department. That is government policy.”

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There was “no suggestion” from either government department that things were going to change, she told MPs. “I don’t recognise this premise that there is an FCO takeover and I reject it completely,” she said.

“It’s important to recognise that 74% of overseas development assistance rests with DfID and the rest in other departments. One of the things I don’t think is recognised enough is we encourage other departments to be more transparent.”

Patel’s comments came after the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, appeared to make a play for his department to absorb DfID, saying it was a “colossal mistake in the 1990s to divide the Department for International Development from the Foreign Office”. Earlier this month, Johnson told the Sun: “If we are going to be this great global campaigner for free trade, then we have got to maximise the value of overseas engagements.”

Following the June election, when Patel was reappointed to DfID, two of her junior ministers, Rory Stewart and Alistair Burt, took joint positions across DfID and the Foreign Office, in what was perceived by some as a partial victory for Johnson’s takeover plans.

Recently, the prime minister’s office has pushed for closer cooperation with the Foreign Office and a more “cross-government” aid strategy.

By 2020, a third of the aid budget is set to be spent by departments other than DfID, drawing concern from charities and aid agencies, which see the Foreign Office as a far less transparent body with different standards for quality of aid impact.

The development secretary was questioned on Tuesday by members of the international development committee on a number of issues, including the Rohingya crisis, her push on UN reform and on the government’s attempts to change the rules on what counts as foreign aid.

She told the committee she saw the importance of modernising the regulations on aid, but she recognised the value of a “rule-based” international system. She said that more needed to be done on the “appalling scandal” of alleged child rape and sexual abuse under the auspices of the UN. The organisation should not be allowed to “mark its own homework”, she said, and called for the lifting of UN immunity for alleged perpetrators as well as a system for whistleblowers to report. A new allegation of sexual abuse of a child by UN peacekeepers emerged this month.

Last weekend, Patel launched DfID’s new humanitarian policy at the World Bank, to push for “a more efficient, effective humanitarian system for the 21st century that can meet vulnerable people’s long term needs”. The policy includes ensuring the most vulnerable people are not prey to sexual predators operating within the UN.

DfID, the world’s second largest humanitarian donor after the US, said the policy would have three main aims: to push for more radical reform of the humanitarian system to include more efficiency and innovation; to bring together humanitarian and development funding to support education, jobs and social protection in the world’s increasingly protracted crises; and to help countries prepare for humanitarian crises by building resilience and resolving conflicts.

Patel called for urgent changes to international regulations on overseas aid after it emerged existing rules prevented the UK from using its aid budget to help British overseas territories hit by Hurricane Irma.